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"Thy terribleness hath deceived thee,

And the pride of thine heart,

O thou that dwellest in the clefts of the rock,
That holdest the height of the hill:

Though thou exalt thyself as the eagle,

And though thou set thy nest among the stars,
Thence will I bring thee down, saith the Lord."

The writers of the New Testament were straight historians and showed few signs of poetic temperament. As a rule they confined themselves to recounting incidents. Revelations remind us of the richness and colour of Solomon, but the birds are not given place. Of those quoted in the compilation of the New Testament the Master Himself was the poet. He often broke into pure poetry of exalted strain, but in only two instances concerning the birds. When the scribe came to Jesus and offered to follow Him, He, in thinking of how many privations and hardships were endured by His disciples, cried:

"The foxes have holes,

The birds of the air have nests,

But the Son of Man hath not where to lay

His head."

This was said in no spirit of complaint, but merely as a warning to the man who would follow the Master that there would be no worldly profit in so doing.

The other reference to feathered creatures was made after fowl had been imported and domesticated until they were a common sight. The habit of the cock in waking the day with its lusty crow was in the mind of the Master when He said to Peter, "Before the cock crow, thou shalt deny Me thrice." Again, this time in a flight of pure poesy, when He stretched His arms toward Jerusalem, the loved city, and cried:

"O Jerusalem, Jerusalem!

How oft would I have gathered thee,

Even as a hen gathereth her chickens under

her wings,

But ye would not!"

Of all the poetic references to birds in the Bible, the one that sinks deepest in my heart and recurs oftenest to

my thought is that of Malachi. He was the last writer of the Old Testament and tried to summarize his impressions, in his own words to give "the burden of the word of the Lord" in four short serious chapters. After explaining his conclusions as to the purposes and provinces of the Creator, his heart surged hot with pulsing adoration and his crowning poetic thought took form in this promise of the Almighty, which to me is unsurpassed for beauty of poetic imagery among the poets of the nations:

"But unto you that fear My name,

Shall the Sun of Righteousness arise,
With healing in His wings."

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"And these ye shall have in abomination among the fowls."

-MOSES.

AFTER Moses had led the Hebrews from that "hard bondage, wherein they were made to serve," he located them in what is now known as the Holy Land. Because they long had been accustomed to slavery and its exactions, he was compelled to make severe laws for them in this wonderful freedom, or he could not have held them together and founded a great nation with their blood. So he laid down laws for religious rites, for daily conduct, for dress, for food, and for the building of their homes and temples. It is with these "pure food" laws of Moses that this chapter is concerned.

In that part of the laws relating to the birds, the King James translation of the Bible names the eagle, ossifrage, and ospray, vulture, and kite, after his kind; the raven, the owl, night hawk, cuckoo, and hawk; the little owl, cormorant, and great owl; swan, pelican, and great eagle ; stork, heron, and lapwing. The latest version makes some change in this. Beginning with the eagle, it changes the ossifrage to the gier eagle, leaves the ospray, changes the vulture and kite to the kite and falcon; leaves the raven, changes the owl to ostrich, leaves the night hawk, and changes the cuckoo to the sea mew; leaves the hawk, little owl, cormorant, great owl, and vulture, and adds the horned owl; drops the swan, leaves the pelican, changes the great eagle to the vulture, and ends with the stork, heron, and lapwing, as does the old version. There are only three changes of any importance that of the owl to the ostrich, of the cuckoo to the sea mew, and the omission of the swan.

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The translators of the Bible seem to have had much confusion with the owl and the ostrich; and the term ya'anah," meaning greediness, was applied in several instances to the owl where Bible students of wide research are sure the ostrich was intended.

If people cared to eat cuckoos, they might have been used as food; but as the sea mews lived on fish and carrion, there was sufficient reason why the ban should be placed on them. As for the swan, there is no probability that it was designated among the birds of abomination. Geese, ducks, and swans are older than any historical record. They are water-birds whose food is not in any way objectionable to the most fastidious palate. They always have been eaten, and when young and tender are considered great delicacies. Swans were not very plentiful, but they did exist at the time and in the land of Moses, and no doubt were among the fatted fowl served at great feasts in Bible lands, as they were in Greece and Italy at that time.

The other changes merely apply to different members of the eagle, vulture, hawk, and owl families. Undoubtedly Moses found every species of all these unfit for food, for he was a man of fastidious taste and great learning. He has the sanction of our time, and almost all nations from the beginning. However, when this law was made it was necessary, for the mountaineers of Lebanon were eating hawks and eagles, and so were the halfwild tribes of Syria and Arabia, with which the Hebrews would come in contact.

Of these nineteen birds mentioned in the latest version of the Bible, thirteen are referred to elsewhere for other reasons, so that their history belongs in the chapter devoted to them. But the night hawk, sea mew, heron, lapwing, ospray, and vulture are mentioned only in the food laws, and only as birds of " abomination."

THE NIGHT HAWK

Almost every Bible student and commentator has a personal opinion as to the bird here intended. The Hebrew word, "tachmas," originally means, "to tear or

scratch the face." That probably would happen to one coming in contact with any captive hawk or owl, and easily might occur in the case of any two dozen different birds. The first translators of the Bible thought this referred to a bird identical with our strix flammea, or barn owl.

To me it seems that the later version indicates the night hawk, or night jar, and as it is of this bird we think when we read of the night hawk, I shall write of it. It was in all probability a bird very similar to ours, for there were three species in the Holy Land, one almost identical with ours.

Never was there truer night hawk country than Palestine, where most of the action of the Old Testament was confined. The country is of as mountainous character as Switzerland, though the mountains are much lower. One great plain, Esdraelon, sweeps from the ocean to the river, lesser plains lie between hills and mountains; there are many small lakes connected by rivers, and wherever there was moisture, rank vegetation flourished, and spicy shrubs and waxy sweet flowers that attracted insects. One of the rivers often mentioned by Bible writers, the Kedron, is now lying a dry bed, but in those days it was of importance, as it helped to water the plains.

To all the attractions of location almost tropical climate was added, so that earth afforded no more alluring haunt for the night hawk. There was mountain, valley, and plain hunting for food, taken on wing; perfumed air so thick with insects that they were a pest to the people, river and lake water frequent, and little shelves among the rocky mountains, and bare brown spots of plain for nesting-places, where the colour of nature would so match the birds' backs as to conceal them when brooding.

Here they could deposit their eggs, so similar in colour to the earth upon which they were laid, with scarcely an attempt at nest-building, that one might step upon them unaware. The brooding birds were shades of greyish white, browns, and tans, and quite as invisible as the eggs. It was the habit of these birds when brooding to remain perfectly quiet upon the nest, trusting that their likeness

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